Near Field Communication (“NFC”) is an emerging technology that enables transactions—e.g., Point Of Sale (“POS”)—and communications between at least two NFC-enabled devices at very short ranges.
Touch-based gestures are possible with NFC-enabled devices in order to pair two such NFC-enabled devices. These close range-based gestures provide for selectivity between the devices to be paired, among many other devices that may be nearby. And that the devices must be physically brought together requires a deliberate action, removing the ambiguity that might be present with longer-range radio connections such as Bluetooth, WiFi, or 3G/4G cellular.
However, merchants who may be interested in the commercial possibility of utilizing NFC at the point of sale or point of service within their retail stores, may find that few customers have NFC-enabled phones that enable these types of transactions.
Heretofore, NFC-enabled devices are not as ubiquitous as other types of wireless communications—for example, Bluetooth-enabled and/or WiFi-enabled devices. In addition, given the established infrastructure for these other wireless standards, these other wireless standards have many desirable attributes but as previously embodied, lack the benefits of the selective and deliberate nature of NFC transactions.